Many of our visitors admire the tiling in the Triple House.  Unfortunately, in some areas, the tiles were missing and elsewhere they were chipped and broken.  John Hodges and Paul Worley undertook the task of restoring them.  The first thought was to approach commercial tile makers.  Some could not help at all and others were put off by the fact that there are 15 different moulded shapes of tile in the Triple House.  One company offered to produce them but would have charged £400 per mould, plus the cost of the tiles, with no guarantee of being able to match our colours.  At one of our filmings, one corner of the Triple House was used as a Victorian operating theatre.  The tiles were featured but one or two were broken.  These were repaired by the film production company.  This gave John and Paul the idea. If a film company can do it, why can’t we?

First, casts were taken of existing tiles using dental plaster.  From these, master moulds were made using casting plaster sprayed with car enamel to prevent sticking.  Casting boxes were made of Lego bricks and new tiles were cast using the master moulds.  Flat tiles were cast straight into Lego boxes.  Small chips and gouges were repaired in situ using Milliput, a two-part epoxy putty.  This was filed to shape after setting.

The first attempts at hand painting new tiles with artists’ acrylics and then varnishing were not very successful.  The existing tiles have a graduated colour from centre to edges which was not easy to reproduce.   After many experiments, an acceptable match was achieved.  After priming, the edges were sprayed with a light green and the whole tile over-sprayed with a darker green while the first coat is still wet.  The chosen paints were Holts car enamels.  The lighter green was Rover Applejack and the darker, a pearlescent Ford Tourmallard Green. 

Setting the tiles on the wall was not easy.  Not only did the tiles have complex shapes, but the existing tiles were not always evenly spaced.  Commercially available tile spacers could not be used so cocktail sticks or larger pieces of wood cut to size were used as spacers.  Grouting presented a further challenge.  Existing grouting has a brownish tinge from years of oil impregnation.  Various additives were tried including graphite powder, acrylic paint and even used tea bags.  Finally a wash of brown water colour paint seemed to be the best.

John and Paul have acquired many new skills and applied much ingenuity in the course of this project.  It is difficult to see where the tiles have been repaired and replaced.  It all goes to show that restoration is not solely an engineering function!

The upper photo (right) show a section of wall in the process of restoration. The lower photo shows the work almost completed.